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RSSArchive for the ‘arts & crafts’ CategoryIt’s a good thing Raphael didn’t attend public school in modern day WisconsinPosted April 19th, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, education, history, religion14 Comments »
The Tomah Area School District in Wisconsin has a policy that bans Christian symbols in students’ artwork, leading to a high school student receiving a Zero on his illustration depicting a landscape with a cross and the lettering “John 3:16.” Michelangelo, Raphael, Da Vinci, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, Giotto, and the rest of the famous artists who produced the religious masterpieces of the world: I’m forever grateful that you didn’t live in 21st century America where you have to sign away your freedom of religious expression.
Technorati Tags: art history, famous artists, First Amendment, religious expression Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots Winner!Posted April 15th, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, blog stuff, carnivals, giveaways, product review0 Comments I’m pleased to announce the winner of my Gardening with Children book: commenter #17, AreWeThereYetMom, your book will be on the way shortly! Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots: Gardening Together With Children is sure to delight your whole family! Thank you so much, everyone who left me a comment on that post. Thanks to Laura for mentioning this book giveaway!
My current book giveaway is two homemade books from the Diary of 1 family, for those interested in native plant life. You may leave me a comment on The Child’s Spring Book by this Sunday to learn about these books and enter the drawing.This giveaway actually has a project attached to it - my kids are putting together an Oregon plant/nature book - a cute ziplock-bag-book - to pass on to a child who lives anywhere other than where we live. And I hope that child will then create a book highlighting his/her region to pass on to another child, and so on. It’s a very simple book, so don’t be intimidated to try it! -P.S., our Oregon book will have some child-intriguing extra odds and ends from our property, like these:
One more note about contests: I actually won something!! SmallWorld had a spring poetry contest, and my mom’s poem, Morning, was chosen, and I hear that I have a basket of spring goodies on the way to me, which of course I’ll share with my mom - can’t wait to show you! And those blog carnivals: The Carnival of Homeschooling, the Carnival of Homesteading, the Carnival of Family Life, the Christian Carnival, the Make it From Scratch Carnival. Technorati Tags: children, contest, garden, gardening with children, giveaway, Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots Carnival of Homesteading #45Posted April 14th, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, blog stuff, carnivals, family life, health/cooking/food, the ranch10 Comments »
So here is a very SIMPLE carnival, which I suppose is in keeping with the theme of homesteading! There were just 12 submissions, which I’ve listed first, followed by some of my own Top 10 Editor’s Picks that I grabbed from around the blogosphere, which fit the homesteading motif. You’ll find my own small commentary following each post. (Let me know if you find any errors, omissions, bad links, etc.) Rose Denson presents Spearmint Hot Pepper Horseradish Spray posted at Grandma Rosie’s Texas Home.
Dora Renee’ Wilkerson presents Making Cottage Cheese posted at Y-2K Hippie.
Belle presents My Diary of No Shampoo—-Day 4 and 5 posted at Born 100 Years to Soon.
Valereee presents Foraging: hot new foodie trend, or the hottest new foodie trend? posted at Cincinnati Locavore.
Dave Trenholm presents How to Make a Square Foot Garden posted at Alberta Home Gardening.
Moobeema presents MooBee Farm: The Burn Barrel Incident posted at MooBee Farm.
Sister Brenda presents Da Yooper Pasties Recipe and Tutorial posted at haflinger.
Flossie presents Aunt Lizzie’s Pound Cake posted at The Funny Farm.
Stephanie presents So Much to Say! posted at Adventures in the 100 Acre Wood.
GP presents How Green is Your Garden posted at Innstyle Montana- Come on Inn.
Miss Amanda presents Cake Baking Photo Essay posted at My Learning Experience.
Jacque Dixon presents From the Archives- Gardening 101 - You *Can* Teach Your Children!! posted at Seeking Rest in the Ancient Paths.
At Tales from Creekistan, I found The Daffodil House. Just don’t look inside the house. At Blind Pig & the Acorn, I enjoyed The Fields of Home. I love that field, and read her garden wisdom. At Hidden Haven Homestead, this author is Counting Blessings. I’m just trying to count the goats. Down On The Farm shares some “Tails” From the Farm. In search of the perfect Jersey cow - bringing Buttercup home to the Back Forty. At Kentucky Hollers, Running Into the Neighbors can be a literal experience, and Catherine discovers that sometimes movie stars retire to the Appalachian foothills. Adventures in Farming coins a new saying, Snug as pigs in straw. The cutest little things I’ve ever seen. In My Kitchen Garden has an intriguing offer: Attention Homeless Organic Vegetable Lovers: Would You Like To Move To A Farm? Seriously. Pack your bags and go live with the enormous pot-bellied pig. Old Red Barn Co. clarifies work: It’s the reason you have kids, afterall. It was planting time, and lucky for Dana, she has a few sprightly young’uns. Yarnstorm muses about tulips and tempests.Wow, those colors. CraftApple instructs us on Gathering. For the seamstress in you - simple, foolproof techniques for a perfect gather. Happy homesteading, now get on with your baking, planting, stitching, haying, milking, crafting, canning, quilting life! Stay tuned next week, when the Homesteading Carnival will be hosted by Jacque at Seeking Rest in Ancient Paths. Submit your Homesteading posts HERE. Technorati Tags: blog carnival, carnivals, farm, garden, gardening with children, homesteading Two Impressionist Paintings Recovered - Madness!Posted February 23rd, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts3 Comments »
A glaring sign that the robbers are mental cases? Just sitting there in the back of an unlocked white car, completely unharmed. The robbers don’t like pictures of beautiful flowers? How dare they cast aside that ravishing Monet! The other two stolen paintings, still not found, were portraits. And sorry for my uneducated opinion, but not pleasant to look at. Count Lepic and His Daughters (Edgar Degas), with the Count appearing rather hideous and his daughters like castaway dolls; and the mournful looking Boy in a Red Waistcoat by Paul Cezanne — would you want these hanging on your wall? Of course you would, if you’re a mental case.
Of interest: Kayla Webley’s Art Crime Blog and Stolen Vermeer.
Technorati Tags: art heist, art recovery, Bührle Collection, Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Paul Cezanne, Zurich, Switzerland Art Heist: What’s Your Theory?Posted February 12th, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, germany, politics/world news5 Comments »
The spectacular art heist of this past Sunday at the Bührle Museum in Zurich has rocked the art world, and police are working around the clock to solve the case and find any possible connections with other recent thefts, including the theft the previous week of two Pablo Picasso paintings stolen from a Swiss exhibition near Zurich. A note on the museum’s website says “The museum remains closed.”
The stolen art work has been valued at $180 million and comprised four Impressionist masterpieces: Poppies near Vetheuil by Claude Monet (1879), Count Lepic and his Daughters by Edgar Degas (1871), Blossoming Chestnut Branch by Vincent Van Gogh (1890) and Boy in a Red Waistcoat by Paul Cezanne (1888). Since this month my blog features have been about great artists, and the first artist I covered was Impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir, this breaking news certainly caught my attention. The Bührle Museum did have a Renoir on display, Little Irene, but it wasn’t touched, probably because the three masked gunmen couldn’t carry anymore heavy paintings, and the robbers appeared to have just taken the first four they came to. Motive? I mean, you can’t go out and sell the famous stolen art. “It’s extremely hard, if not impossible, to sell these works,” said Michaela Derra of Ketterer Kunst GmbH, a Munich, Germany-based purveyor of modern and contemporary art. Here is a speculation:
However, I have my own little theory. There is apparently a Saudi collector sending his thugs out to steal art for his private collection. None of the current stories I’ve found on the Bührle theft have mentioned this connection, so I could be promoting an absurd idea. Nonetheless, just two months ago, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, paintings by Picasso and Portinari were stolen, but recovered. One of the suspects in the case told detectives the paintings were to be delivered to a Saudi collector, who has not been publicly named by authorities. The history of Mr. Emil G. Bührle is very interesting, and perhaps he himself was a collector who obtained stolen art, and conceivably everything has come full circle. Bührle, born in Germany, was an industry tycoon who provided weapons to the Third Reich during World War II. In the aftermath of the war, he amassed one of Europe’s most valuable collections of art. It’s a tragedy of the war that the Nazis looted much of the great art owned by Jews, and many of Bührle’s pieces were on a “looted art list.” Exactly how Bührle obtained his collection is unknown, but some of it is “flight art,” works smuggled out by Jews and sold at bargain-basement prices to avoid confiscation by Nazis. Maybe this art heist was Jews taking back their rightful property, via a Saudi collector, who will ask for a ransom. At this point, any theory can be thrown into the ring. On My WallPosted January 11th, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, family life1 Comment » Do you have a favorite picture or wall hanging? Can I see it? Here is my current favorite, gracing a short wall in my bedroom. Don’t we need to always be mindful of these words from 1 Corinthians 13, especially with our spouses? I’ll do a second post next week with links to all of your special works of art, for those of you who participate. Don’t forget to leave me a comment so I know where to find your link. Have a blessed weekend.
Winter CarnivalsPosted January 3rd, 2008 by Jen in arts & crafts, carnivals, holidays3 Comments » I have a few blog carnivals to update here, but I also discovered several Winter Carnivals around the world that look fabulously winterish and I wish I could attend them all!
And there’s definitely a feeling of winter in the air at the Carnival of Family Life. You can enjoy a virtual visit to this carnival of wintery blog entries. St. Paul, Minnesota, is famous for its Winter Carnival, the oldest and largest winter festival in the United States. Unbelievable ice sculptures, fun parades, cultural celebrations, and even an elaborate treasure hunt. Back in 1885, a New York reporter wrote that winter in St. Paul was “another Siberia, unfit for human habitation.” St. Paul set out to prove him wrong, and the result was the first St. Paul Winter Carnival, full of life and activity. After a visit to St. Paul, you can head to the next carnival, The Carnival of Homeschooling, with many New Year and winter themes as well! It’s the second anniversary of this carnival, and the hosts are wanting a new look. If you can come up with a new graphic to represent the Homeschool Carnival, be sure to enter it in the contest at Why Homeschool.
I have a cousin who lives in Sapporo, and he used to tell me about having snow up to his rooftop. All that snow gets turned into hundreds of gorgeous snow sculptures, lit up at night in brilliant light. It’s a wintery fantasy land. Are you feeling cold yet? Keep those gloves on, there’s a long winter ahead! It’s not so chilly over at the Christian Carnival, so stop in there and warm your soul. I’d also like to tell you that Diary of 1 will be hosting two different carnivals in January, 2008. The Christian Carnival will be right here on January 16, and the Carnival of Family Life will be presented here on January 21. Prepare those entries, I’m ready for some more fabulous winter carnivals! The week preceding each carnival, you are invited to submit your entry here for the Christian Carnival, and here for the Carnival of Family Life. Pumpkin Patch/Petting Zoo in Black and WhitePosted October 19th, 2007 by Jen in arts & crafts, family life6 Comments » We visited the pumpkin patch this week, and the kids have been happily drawing faces on their new orange buddies. We won’t carve them for another week, since we like them to last at least until October 31 without withering and wrinkling. I am lucky enough to have two fabulous pumpkin patches within ten minutes of my house. The farm we went to this week has a petting zoo, a play area with a hay maze, a country store filled with homestyle goodies, hay rides, and of course the pumpkins. Next week, we’ll visit the other pumpkin patch. Here are a few of my photos, in glorious black & white, from our outing. The Kids and I in the Pumpkin Patch
My Farm Boy is Ready to Wrangle The Big Boy Feeds the Llama Bunny Love for My Animal Loving Girl Umm, What to Say…Welcome to Sweet Farm Life Break a Leg, er, FingerPosted June 11th, 2007 by Jen in arts & crafts, education, product review3 Comments » In honor of this week’s Carnival of Homeschooling theme of “Fun,” (up tomorrow) this post is about a fun past-time over here, puppet shows.
We began with about a dozen puppets I gathered from various stores, and I’m such a frugal shopper that I found them all for between $1 and $5 - and some free, if you count the socks and gloves. I’m still on the lookout for some reasonably priced little boy and little girl (normal-looking children) puppets, so if you know of a deal, pass it on. I will not pay $15 for a puppet, so don’t bother passing that information along.
Occasionally, I visit the Well-Trained Mind swap board, and that’s where I discovered our first scripts. Thank you, Kristin!! There’s this amazing homeschool mom on a farm in Nebraska, Kristin Greenhalgh, who’s written several Christian-themed Puppet Script books. I ordered every single one, and you can find them here. We’ve performed several of these, and most are perfect for 1-4 children of a variety of ages, maybe ages 6-12. My favorites are The Reason for the Seasons volumes, covering every holiday from Advent to Yom Kippur. I told Kristin many months ago that I’d review her books here, so considered them reviewed: A+. Along with the Seasons scripts, Kristin has written Walking with God, 16 short scripts depicting important steps in the Christian walk. We like “Taming the Tongue.” Her scripts aren’t cheesy or tacky like some I’ve seen, but have very age appropriate dialogue. The third series, Living Like Jesus, includes 20 short scripts teaching Christ-like character traits and virtues. Great discussion questions follow each script, and when I say short, they are 1-2 pages long, perfect for young performers. You may also be interested in some online scripts that you can download for free. Reader’s Theater Editions has dozens of free scripts adapted from stories written by Aaron Shepard and others - lots of myths and tall tales. Reader’s theatre is different from puppet theater, but I’ve easily modified them. My kids especially enjoyed taking to the stage with The Baker’s Dozen. Acting and playmaking is such a wonderful, creative outlet for children. For homeschoolers, consider practicing a play with your own family or joining with another family, and put on a show for friends and relatives. You certainly don’t need the traditional “school play” model preventing your homeschooling kids from putting on a grand production! I Own a MonetPosted May 21st, 2007 by Jen in arts & crafts, education5 Comments » Our art time lately has been focused on Impressionism. My kids just seemed to like the feel of a fleeting moment on canvas, so we’re going with it. Impressionists were known for leaving their studios to get outside and paint in the open air, and were intensely interested in every aspect of light. Hey, that fits our family, it’s no wonder the kids like this style. I’m not artistic and have taken just one art class ever. But I’m here to encourage you that it doesn’t matter if you know Monet from Manet, if you even care about shadows and shading, or if you’re artistically clumsy like me. You can successfully teach art to your kids, and the method that’s working for me is Classical Immersion. I don’t know if that’s really a term, I just made it up.
The Classical Immersion method that produced this darling reproduction was simple. Lots of time spent with originals.
I think it’s great for kids to have plenty of creative self-expression time, and we have lots of that over here. The usual bag of art supplies is always handy - construction paper, glue, markers, paints, play dough, doodads. But by Classical, I mean being somewhat ordered, using original sources. Ruth Beechick writes, “Our society is so obsessed with creativity that people want children to be creative before they have any knowledge or skill to be creative with.” I think she’s referring to teaching language, but the idea can be applied across the spectrum. Those people who are trained to spot the counterfeit bills - guess what they spend all their time doing? Studying the original. Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise put it this way in their book, The Well Trained Mind: “Squeeze a dry sponge, and nothing comes out. First the sponge has to be filled.”
For studying Monet, we got some videos from the library about his life. Linnea in Monet’s Garden was really fun. Little Linnea gets to visit Giverny and walk among the gardens where Claude Monet painted his “blobs and smears,” as she notes. Monet from the series Getting to Know the World’s Greatest Artists was also a hit. If we had an art museum nearby, we’d go. But we don’t. So the books and videos are our museums, and we’ve had quite a few strolls down the their halls.
Here is the original Camille Pissarro, which now hangs in the Musee du Louvre in Paris.
After spending weeks on Impressionism, my son declared that he wanted to be an artist. That just means that he enjoyed our art time. After digging into a fun science project, he wants to be a scientist. That’s a good measuring rod for me, and his reactions tell me whether I’m teaching in such a way that reaches him and allows him to fully respond to the subject. Here comes the trainPosted March 19th, 2007 by Jen in arts & crafts, education, science0 Comments I love a picturesque, rural landscape, and my kids adore trains. I caught this scene a few days ago, as we were stopped at a train crossing in Terrebonne, OR. You can see Smith Rock in the background, and if you could hear, you’d be listening to my kids whooping in delight above the loud cry of the train whistle.
We were too inspired to pass up Smith Rock after seeing this, so the next day we headed over to the climbing mecca of the Northwest. Yeah, we go here a lot, and you would, too, if this was in your backyard.
Here I am with the kids, about to head down into the gorge where you see the Crooked River running through. This was part of our school day, and so here we are sketching the amazing spires of rock (…how did this get here, the kids ask). A local artist happened to be hiking by as the kids were happily engaged in their creative drawings, and had some kind words to offer.
What you see here is a wonderful little snapshot of the flexibility I love about home education. An inspiring moment with a train can lead to an afternoon of hiking, exploring, discussions about volcanic origins, creative art, and more nuances of my children’s development than I can know. To comment, click on the title above, then go to the bottom of the post and add your comment. Valentine’s K.I.S.S.Posted February 14th, 2007 by Jen in arts & crafts1 Comment » That’s keep it simple, sweetie. Valentine’s Day has become quite a festive overdose of candies and gifts. Two statistics that, for some reason, make me want to rebel: Valentine’s Day ranks second in the greeting card giving occasion, not including packaged kids Valentines (how about the Disney princess with the plunging neckline); and per capita consumption of candy by Americans is about 25 pounds. We do enjoy holidays over here, but for my sanity I need to keep things very basic. So, we spent the morning making cards (total supplies = a few sheets of construction paper, pen, and stickers). one of daughter Jaime’s cards Then, we made playdough in the Valentine color of choice to give as gifts. Here’s the very simple recipe: Best Playdough Recipe Heat on low, stirring often, until playdough pulls away from pan. Jaime cooking it up A nice Valentine red Then we shaped the playdough into hearts, and placed it in plastic bags with the card attached. Voila, we’re done with the entire thing. Final touches Because we homeschool, we have the great privilege of avoiding the school parties that used to usher my kids home with tummy aches followed by sickness from the sugar shock to the immune system. Hooray for home! I actually have a friend whose kids are in school, but she is pulling them out for the day (to have a party with us, with our very simple cards and playdough). And no sugar. Well, maybe a tiny bit. |
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Welcome to the 45th Carnival of Homesteading! If you’ve been around here when I host a Blog Carnival, you know how much I love themes! But, alas, I had issues. Computers, kids, work, and some other meanies all conspired against me. Or maybe I was just lazy.
Two of the four impressionist paintings 
Perhaps there’s something we don’t know about here. Was a ransom paid for the two returned paintings? And the two still at large, the more valuable ones, perhaps waiting a larger ransom? Why else undergo such a high risk theft only to return two of the masterpieces less than two weeks later? Only if you’re a raving lunatic.
There’s the oldest running winter carnival in the Eastern United States, in its 111th year, the 
Any list of Winter Festivals would be incomplete without the 
My gift to the kids this past Christmas was a Puppet Theater. You really don’t need a store-bought model, but I found a sale and we’ve dramatized over this enough to pay for it several times.
Our initial “plays” consisted of bopping the other’s puppet over the head and spiraling into wild screams and laughter. This is all good, but sometimes you want a little more. :-)
So, I do own a Monet. To be exact, it’s 
The immersion part of my method is really simple, too. I guess this would fit the Unit Method approach to teaching. Everything Impressionist we could get our hands on, we did. My basic “text” was a book that happened to be on my bookshelf, called 
